


How Dean Lost His Breasts

by theangelhastheimpala



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen, Gender Dysphoria, Menstruation, Nonbinary Character, Slurs, Trans Character, Trans Dean, Trans Female Character, Trans Male Character, Trans Sam, Transgender
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-09
Updated: 2015-01-09
Packaged: 2018-03-06 20:19:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3147284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theangelhastheimpala/pseuds/theangelhastheimpala
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Deanna Winchester is not happy with her name or her body.</p>
            </blockquote>





	How Dean Lost His Breasts

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Erenn](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Erenn/gifts).



> I've wanted to write transchesters for a while, and I'm really excited that I'm finally taking that leap. Warnings are in the tags.

She was four. “That boy’s gonna do big things,” Missouri pronounced the second she laid her eyes on the Winchester kids, Dean clutching Sam protectively in her grasp. She was talking about Sam, of course. Sam was always going to be the favored one; Deanna knew that already. He was the son John Winchester had always wanted. 

Missouri crouched down to the kids’ level. “Pleased to meet you—you go by Dean, don’t you? And you, too, Sammy.”

Dean smiled. She didn’t know how she’d known; John always introduced them as Samuel and Deanna. But Dean was shorter. It fit better on her tongue. 

“You don’t have to talk,” Missouri said. “Must be hard on ya.” She looked up at John. “Nothing wrong with him. He’ll talk when he’s ready.” 

“Her.” John clenched his jaw. “She’ll talk when she’s ready.” 

“Right.” Missouri nodded. “It’s been a long day, must have me seeing things.” She shot a wink at Dean before straightening. Dean smiled, but she didn’t know why. 

##### 

Dean locked herself in the bathroom, safety scissors in hand. She was tired of the messy bob. John tried to keep it up himself, but he always got hair in her eyes when he trimmed the bangs. Mary had never gotten hair in her eyes. She pulled off her plaid blouse, groaning when she saw the pink flowers lining the tank top underneath. 

“Gross,” she whispered, then clapped her hand over her mouth. She didn’t want to alert John to what she was doing. She shucked the undershirt off too, not wanting to get hair all over her clothes. She held up the bangs with one hand, judging how much she wanted off, and brought up the scissors with the other hand. She bit her tongue as she began snipping. 

Sammy started laughing when Dean came out of the bathroom. So she was the first to admit, she looked like a hedgehog. But he was only three and didn’t know anything, and her hair was finally hers. It was something she’d done for herself, and when she shook her head and felt no hair flopping against her cheeks, she knew she’d made the right choice.  
John stared at her. “What did you do to yourself?” 

“I cut it,” Dean said. She stood up straight and clutched her left wrist behind her back. “I wanted it short.” 

He looked her over for what seemed like an eternity. She closed her eyes and bit her lip. 

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I just wanted it off.” 

Finally, she peeked through her eyelashes and saw that he wasn’t glaring at her. He was almost smiling. 

“It’ll be better on hunts,” he said. “Can’t get grabbed by it. But you can’t go out looking like that.” 

He grabbed her by the arm and dragged her to the Impala. She strapped Sammy into the car seat in the back. It was stained with juice and covered in graham cracker crumbs, and she winced as her hand brushed against the sticky fabric. 

Dean’s shoulders were slumped as John walked her into the barber shop, one hand on her back.  
“Fix her up,” he said to the barber. “Something practical that doesn’t make her look like a pin cushion.” 

Dean closed her eyes as the man snipped away at her hair. She didn’t know what she would look like but it had to be better. Something less girly.

The man whipped the cape away from her shoulders. She looked in the mirror and grinned. It was short, butch, just a bit spiky. It squared away the roundness of her face, and, though she couldn’t hide her chubby cheeks, she looked almost perfect. 

“Dee looks like a boy!” Sammy said when the barber walked her to the front. Something exploded in her chest, warm and happy and safe. 

“I like it,” Dean said. She ran her fingers through the top and smiled wider. 

“Looks pretty.” That didn’t feel right in her stomach, but at least Sam liked it.

“It’ll be practical,” was all John said. He turned up the radio as they drove back to the motel. Dean sang off-key to Led Zeppelin the whole way home. 

#####

And then she was ten. She fidgeted as John pinned her to the wall with his eyes. 

“Don’t,” she said. “I didn’t do anything.” 

He was looking at her again. He was looking at them, the alien lumps of flesh that had invaded her body. She should be smooth and straight, not bulgy. So she wore baggier shirts. She’d shed the flowers on the tank tops. Now she wore practical things. Boy’s jeans moved easier, and flannel shirts were the same for any gender. It was easy to convince John to let her pick out what she wanted, and if what she wanted were superhero shirts and baggy jeans, well, they always had better boys’ stuff at the thrift store anyway. And they would make good hand-me-downs for Sam, if he ever grew any taller. 

But now her body was betraying her. There were these things, these breasts. She learned to slump her shoulders as she walked, and if she wore a too-small tank top underneath her clothes they almost went away. But now, dressed for bed in nothing but one of John’s undershirts and a pair of sleep shorts, there was no way to hide. 

“It’s about time we get you a bra, Deanna,” he said. Dean tried not to throw up. “We’ll go shopping tomorrow.” 

She had to make them go away. The yellow bathroom light flickered as she pulled her shirt off and stared at her naked chest. There was a tiny lump, tipped with a puffy pink circle. She pushed it down, trying desperately to have a flat chest again. 

“This isn’t me,” She leaned over the sink trying not to cry, and whispered prayers to a god she really wasn’t sure about. “Take them off.” Her voice broke. “Please, God. I’ll be so good. Just make them go away.” 

The next morning, she looked down at her chest. They were still there; if anything, they were a little larger than before. 

“I don’t believe in you anymore,” she whispered. Sammy shifted against her in his sleep, and she laid back down, staring at the ceiling until John finally stirred. 

She couldn’t wear the tight undershirt today. Today was bra-fitting day. John actually took them to a Sears. Dean hadn’t been in one in ages, and she looked around wide-eyed at the tractors and refrigerators and what seemed like just everything. And then it was time for the ordeal. 

“Can I help you?” The saleswoman was wearing too much lipstick. She smelled like flowers and wore a pencil skirt. 

“This girl here needs a bra,” John said, shoving her forward. Dean winced as the saleswoman grinned. 

“How exciting! It’s a rite of passage, you know. I remember when I got my first bra.” Her high heels clicked as she ushered them towards the girls’ section. 

John held back as they walked into the underwear section. 

“We’ll be here when you finish,” he said. He shifted, hands in his pockets. Bras weren’t exactly something he was comfortable with. 

The saleswoman whipped out a measuring tape. Dean looked up at her, away from her own alien chest. 

“Hi, my name is Mindy,” Dean read. Mindy kept wrapping the tape around Dean’s chest, whispering numbers to herself as she went. 

“32A,” she said. “We have these lovely bras,” she said, holding up a frilly pink…thing. Dean shook her head. 

“Something practical,” Dean said. “I need to move. And not too girly.” 

“How about this, then?” It was black and simple, the words “Sports Bra” on the tag in bright pink letters.

“I wanna try it on.”

Mindy gave her the bra and pointed her towards the dressing room. Dean had never been in a dressing room. She made faces at herself in the three-way mirror, careful not to look below her shoulders. 

“Everything all right in there?” Mindy called after a few minutes, standing just outside the entrance. 

“Yeah,” Dean said. “It’s just weird to get on!” She didn’t want to admit she’d been avoiding it. 

“It’s just like a shirt,” Mindy said. “Just pull it over your head.” 

Dean went into the nearest room and locked the door. She pulled off her t-shirt with her eyes closed. Maybe if she didn’t look at it, it wouldn’t be there. The bra pulled on easily. She must have seemed seriously ignorant for lying about not being able to put on a sports bra. It was tight over her chest, and when she moved she barely felt it. 

Dean grinned. It would hide them some, and if she pretended it was just a tank top she could almost avoid the issue. Until she was older, at least. 

She didn’t want to take it off, but she had to go. 

“I like it,” Dean said. “I want three.” 

##### 

She screamed when she saw it. She was twelve, and twelve was already a horrible age because she was trapped just between child and teenager so nobody knew how to treat her. Except John, because to him she was a hunter first and a woman second and a child never and nowhere. But then she just wanted to take a shower after a hunt and everything went to hell. 

John pounded on the door. “What’s wrong?” 

She ran out, clad in only a towel, blood trickling down the inside of her thighs. “It got me!” she screamed. “The ghost! It got me!” She paused. “There,” she said, quieter, hands clasped protectively over her crotch. “What do I do? Do I need stitches? Don’t look! Shit, am I dying?” 

John’s shoulders slumped, and he exhaled. 

“You aren’t dying, Deanna,” he said. “And nothing hurt you.” He exhaled, half a laugh. “And watch your damn language. You can cuss all you want when you’re grown.” 

“What’s happening?” She moved towards John, hoping for a hug, but he sat down on the bed. He patted the bed next to him and she sat down, towel still firmly tied into a dress. John put his arm around her. 

“You’re growing up,” he said. “Didn’t they cover this in health class?” Dean, of course, had never sat through a health class. Looking at vaginas made her feel icky, so she faked being sick and sat out the duration of the vagina-talk in the nurse’s office. She shook her head. “Well, you see, when a woman gets to a certain age, she, um, starts bleeding every month. It means someday you’ll be able to have kids.” 

Um, no. This was not acceptable. John blathered on about uterine linings and things, and Dean sat there feeling blood trickle down her thighs.

“And it’ll happen every month until you get pregnant,” Dean caught from John’s monologue. She could feel her uterus cringing. Or maybe that was the cramps. She was pretty sure John had said something about cramps. But the idea of actually having a baby inside her made her feel even sicker than the blood already did. 

“I’m going to go shower,” Dean finally said. She felt blood puddling in the towel. “How do I make it stop bleeding so I can wear clothes?” 

“I’ll run to the store while you’re showering. You can’t make it stop, but I’ll get you some pads to hold it. And chocolate. Mary liked chocolate. You like chocolate ice cream, right?” 

“Yeah.” She was fairly sure that ice cream wouldn’t soothe the pain. She had tried to pretend that she was just sexless, like some Barbie doll down there with none of the useless tubes and holes and folds, but now she couldn’t ignore it. And it wasn’t hers. It was just…there. 

Like her breasts, which she couldn’t ignore anymore. Last week, Johnny Kimball had tried to kiss her under the bleachers, reaching for her chest as he pushed his lips towards hers. She got sent home for slapping him in the face. 

None of this belonged to her. None of this was right. 

#####  
She was sixteen and she knew how to print her own fake IDs. She slaved over the computer, manipulating everything till it was just right.  
“M,” she whispered as she put down the gender. No one would notice. She looked like a boy, mostly. And no one would believe her if she put her name down as Dean and put herself as a girl. It was harmless. 

The next day, she woke up too early and walked down to the football field. The players were in blue and white, and as they crashed their heads together and tackled each other, she waited. She watched how they walked when they swaggered over to the bench or onto the field. Then she jammed her hands in her pockets and tried to copy them. 

It was kind of hard to breathe. She pulled on the three too-small sports bras she wore under her loose black shirt, gasping for oxygen. It was worth it. She looked like herself. She felt for her wallet, running her fingers over her ID and smiling. 

She stole John’s jacket. It smelled like home and made her look like the picture in her head. John didn’t ask for it back. He barely noticed what she did, so long as she was a good hunter. And she could rationalize. Short hair he understood. Androgynous clothing was good for movement. And breasts just got in the way of pushups and fighting. They were an easy target, Dean rationalized. Everything would be all right. She'd be all right. Better, even. She'd be awesome.

But John couldn't stick around forever, and money left easy for a girl who sucked at poker. When she got caught stealing, the name on her ID was Dean. She ended up in a boys’ home, and she didn’t even mind. 

She didn’t look down at her body in the shower, waited until all the other boys were asleep. She hid her tampons as far down in her luggage as they could go. If worst came to worst, she’d claim they were for her sister. She knew how to be a boy, so she was one. 

Then there was Robin. And Dean was playing a boy, so he had to like girls. It wouldn’t matter if he kissed her, just this once. 

And again, and again, and as her insides lit on fire she knew she was completely, totally screwed. 

##### 

Dean liked boys. That was the way things were supposed to be, and she’d admit that Phil Fernbank gave her a certain…tingle. But Lindsay... Lindsay was tall, her brunette hair falling in curls down her back. Her blue eyes stared right through Dean and, miracle of miracles, she smiled. 

“You’ve got pretty eyes,” she said. 

“You’ve got pretty…pretty.” Dean felt like her tongue was tied up in knots. Then Lindsay dragged her into the janitor’s closet. Her lips were smooth and pink and beautiful, and they felt wonderful on her own chapped lips. She just wanted to kiss forever, but Lindsay had other ideas.  
She guided Dean’s hands to her breasts. This was wrong. This was so wrong, and Dean didn’t ever want to stop. Her chest was hot and bright, and something tightened low in her abdomen. 

Lindsay unbuttoned Dean’s pants and shimmied them down her thighs. She sank to her knees, slipping her fingers into the waistband of Dean’s plain white panties. Then she gasped. 

“What the hell is this?” she said, whisper-screaming. 

“It’s me?” Dean said. 

“I thought you were a boy!” Lindsay said, her voice getting louder. 

“I never said that!” Dean said. Her stomach churned. 

“You’re just a fucking tranny,” Lindsay said. She spit out the words underneath her lip gloss. 

“I’m just me,” Dean said. “I’m just Dean.” She bit her lip. Lindsay stormed out of the closet, and Dean pulled up her pants and sank down onto a bucket, holding herself and trying desperately not to cry. It didn’t work.

**Author's Note:**

> Leave a comment to let me know what you think!


End file.
